Introduction
It is commendable that the Federal government through the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation has decided to award nearly half of the 2012/2013 crude oil lifting contracts worth $60 billion to Nigerian companies, thus downsizing the contracts awarded to international oil traders.
I therefore congratulate the successful Nigerian Companies and I hope it will give Nigerian companies the needed leverage to grow and evolve into full fledged International Oil Companies.
The need for Innovation/Intellectual Property Commercialization
At the very minimum however these Nigerian companies need to pay a little more attention to research, development and the resulting innovation which should be protected by Intellectual Property possibly patents.
Oil and Gas Patents
Basically a patent is a document issued, upon application by a government office (or a regional office acting for several countries), which describes an invention and creates a legal situation in which the patented invention can normally only be exploited (manufactured, used, sold, imported) with the authorization of the owner of the patent
Patents in Nigeria are of limited duration, typically providing protection for a period of 20 years from the filing of the application for patent grant.
Patents cover things like cutting-edge technologies used in instrumentation, production data capture, horizontal drilling and multilateral wells.
The reality is that Patent Protection “fathered” the Oil Field Service Industry.
Besides, the logistics required to locate, extract, process and transfer crude oil or gas would probably make most companies think twice about even entering the business in the first place. So kudos to companies like Schlumberger Limited, Halliburton, Saipem, Transocean Ltd, Baker Hughes, Fluor, Weatherford International, BJ Services Company, Petrofac, China Oilfield Services Ltd and IBM.
It goes without saying that companies in the oil field service industry, would probably not have been formed and would not continue to exist today without protection of its Intellectual Property!
Commodity Sellers vs. Proprietary Industry…
If the products of Oil Field Service companies were not protected by patents, they would have been priced as a “commodity”.
If their products had been priced as a “commodity”, they may not have been developed and made available to the industry.
The thing is that Intellectual Property Rights are enforceable against the whole world while Contractual Rights are enforceable against only the parties that enter into contract with you!
Commercialisation of Patents and Trade Secret
Patents are public documents which disclose information about the invention (technology) in exchange for state protection, which is the exact opposite of trade secret protection. However commercialisation of patents and trade secret is always a desirable option. Sometimes trade secrets are licensed along with patent rights, in what is called a“hybrid” license.
Conclusion
Thus for our Oil and Gas companies to grow, they are going to have to take their innovation and resulting Intellectual Property like patents and trade secrets seriously, because that is what gave birth to the Oil Field Service Industry in the first place and that is what keeps them in business, the right to exclude others from selling or even using proprietary equipment without permission and hefty license fees!
Intellectual Property becomes a valuable asset to the oil and gas company, when it is registered and steps are taken to prevent competitors from accessing and using it for free.
Megathos Law Practice Copyright © 2012
10 comments
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 8:21 am
Its a very great step in the right direction, although I doubt if any real capacity development would be achieved through contract awards.
Innovation is the key to real development,
OLUWASEUN OMONIYI
July 5, 2012 at 12:25 pm
The Oil and Gas sector does not need Intellectual Property?
The simple way to explain intellectual property is to understand that all great expressions and products have an origin A work of music, art, writing, film, or computer software belongs to its creators.
Your creative expressions and inventions have a lot of value and must be protected however; your ideas are not considered intellectual property.
Anyone who tries to copy or “borrow” your work without permission is profiting from your hard work – your intellectual property – without any credit to you.
Talking about the oil sector in Nigeria, we talk about the primary source of oil which are Bonnylite crude oil, forcados, LPFO or what have you…
Its a natural resource and from my point of view, its not in the list of Industrial property (patents, trademarks, industrial designs, and geographic indications of source) and Copyright (literary and artistic works) / Rights related to copyright (performing artists, producers, and broadcasters).
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 2:00 pm
Very well said sir!
Interestingly a distinguished economist has recognized the Oil and Gas as a Knowledge Industry, that economist is
Lester C. Thurow, who wrote:
Needed: A New System of Intellectual Property Rights, HARVARD BUS. REV., Sept./Oct., 1997, at 95.
He said:
(“Consider the oil industry. The story in the famous James Dean movie, Giant, typified the old means of
success in the oil business: luck and brawn.
But new technologies such as three-dimensional acoustical sounding, horizontal drilling, and deep offshore drilling have turned the oil business into a knowledge industry. Luck and brawn have disappeared. Supercomputers have taken their place. The oil industry now has a big interest in intellectual property
rights.”)
Does anybody agree with this assertion?
That is one way to look at it.
I am sure there are many divergent opinions.
Permit me to say this but its the classic argument Oil and Gas Commodity Market versus Innovation Driven Oil and Gas Industry!
There are three industry-wide imperatives that nearly all stakeholders agree are the keys to building a smarter oil and gas industry in Nigeria:
1. Enhance exploration and production
2. Improve refining and manufacturing efficiency
3. Optimize global operations
I can bet twenty bucks that in between those imperative listed above lies tons of Intellectual Property
Your thoughts folks!
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 2:14 pm
Folks let me ask a question,
Do you think the Oil and Gas industry is a Commodity Market or is it an Innovation Driven/Intellectual Property based Industry?
toby
July 5, 2012 at 2:41 pm
Nice work Sir. In response to ur question above, I view the Oil industry now as more of a commodity market with global demand. From thhat perspective, it is obvious that any Oil Company involved in the sector (which is a ratherr matuure sector, with MOC’s) will merely be satisfies with prrofits from doin buusiness (of liffting petrolleum) as usual, with no real incentive to ennggage in researcch. Unless perrhaps such research can be shown to have reasonably certain commercial prrofit #medium term
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 2:51 pm
Nice pitch sir!
Although I hate to break the news to you that there are tons of studies showing the link between profit and innovation in oil and gas, the easiest industry to look at is the oil field service industry.
Innovation and profits are twin sisters cuz the more problems you solve the more money you make!
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 3:02 pm
Talking about innovation in the Oil and Gas Industry, I once came across articles on it, for obvious reasons I really can’t copy and paste but here are some of the links:
https://www.hightable.com/innovation/insight/ten-lessons-on-innovation-from-oil-and-gas-industr
http://www.spe.org/jpt/print/archives/2003/11/JPT2003_11_guest_ed.pdf
Olufola Wusu Esq
July 5, 2012 at 4:21 pm
I guess you are thinking that not every area of the uupstream sector and the downstream sector requires much Innovation/Intellectual Property…
The thing is that the downstream sector has slimmer profit margins than the upstream sector that automatically means that they need to find better ways to make profit, i.e. ways to produce cheaper, better and faster.
An increase in pump price is certainly not innovative and judging by the innovative Occupy Nigeria protests that greeted such an increment, other forms of innovation in the industry might be a good idea.
Rita Ok
December 30, 2015 at 3:12 pm
Please let me know how to contact you directly in this regard. Thanks.
megathos
July 19, 2020 at 11:34 am
Hello,
Thank you for reaching out.
Please get in touch via the contact form of http://www.megathoslaw.com, for legal advice on how to address your specific situation.
Kind regards,
Megathos LP Team